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Why turnaround time for COVID-19 results can vary

August 3, 2020 – News

If you get tested for COVID-19 at one of the City and Borough of Juneau’s two testing locations – the Drive-Thru Testing Site or the Juneau International Airport – you’ll likely get your test results back in 3-5 days, or sometimes longer. Here’s what happens to your nasal swab after you test for COVID-19 at one of CBJ’s sites and why turnaround time for results can vary.

Capital City/Fire Rescue runs the COVID-19 testing operation for CBJ. After a CCFR staff conducts a nasal swab to get a sample for analyses, the swab gets packaged up to be sent out of Juneau; CBJ does not currently have the capability to process tests locally. Boxes of samples are delivered to Alaska Airlines Air Cargo by 6 pm every night (this is Alaska Airlines’ daily cutoff to drop off cargo) in order to get shipped out at 7:25 am, the first flight the next morning; this is the most expedient way to get samples to the lab in Fairbanks. For most people, that means you take a test one day and the sample gets shipped out the next morning. Tests done after 6 pm, though, miss the daily cutoff to be dropped off at cargo. Given cargo schedules and flight connections, it’s as expedient to keep the samples in Juneau an additional day than shipping them out midday. This means, if you get tested at 7 pm on a Monday, your test gets delivered to cargo on Tuesday night and ships out of Juneau on the first flight Wednesday morning.

Samples from CBJ’s test facilities (except for pre-surgical/pre-procedural tests, which are handled by Bartlett Regional Hospital) get flown to Fairbanks and are processed at the State of Alaska Public Health Laboratory. Swabs arrive there from all over the state and the lab processes the samples in batches. Due to high testing demand, the lab has a prioritization system for processing. How long your sample is at the lab before being analyzed will depend on the volume of swabs at the lab and how the lab prioritizes and batches your test. That means, tests that arrive to the state lab together may not get processed together. For instance, it is not uncommon for a family of four – all tested at the same time – to get their results on different days. The state lab in Fairbanks also doesn’t analyze tests on Sunday, which can cause additional delay in getting results.

When the lab determines the result of your test, it gets entered into a state web portal. If your result is positive, the lab contacts CCFR and Public Health by phone. Public Health will then notify you by phone immediately. CCFR staff check the state web portal for results several times a day and inputs the data into a CBJ web system, which automatically emails negative results to individuals. Depending on your email platform, automated emails may bounce back or go straight to a person’s spam. This part of the process may add further variability in turnaround.

Every day, CCFR gets test results back from the state that span certain days of collection. To find out what dates those are, go to CBJ’s COVID-19 webpage and look for “STATUS OF COVID-19 TEST RESULTS.” If you took your test during this period, there’s a high likelihood you’ll be receiving an email from “CCFR COVID Testing.” Keep in mind, some results for tests conducted during this period may also come in at a later date. Please look in your email spam folder when checking for results. If seven or more days have passed since you tested for COVID-19 and you have not received your results, call 586-6000 or email [email protected].

CBJ is actively working on procuring its own testing equipment and supplies in order to process COVID-19 tests in Juneau. Demand for testing equipment significantly outstrips supply and CBJ is in line for multiple options.

If you have symptoms of COVID-19, even mild ones, call your primary healthcare provider or call the COVID-19 Screening Hotline at 586-6000, 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. daily. Testing will be arranged if appropriate.